1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a cable end connector assembly, and more particularly to a Serial ATA cable end connector assembly which has a decreasing transverse size for electrically connecting with a complementary electrical connector more reliably.
2. Description of Related Art
There exists in the art an electrical connector assembly known as a Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (Serial ATA) cable end connector assembly which is generally used for transmitting high-speed signals between disk drives and a mother board. Because of many advantages superior to Parallel ATA, Serial ATA has a possibility of replacing Parallel ATA and becomes the next transmitting generation.
The Serial ATA cable end connector assembly generally comprises a cable end connector and a cable connecting with the cable end connector. The assembly mates with a complementary electrical connector mounted on an edge of the mother board for transmitting signals. With the developing trend of integration and miniature of the mother board, electrical components of the mother board are arranged closely more and more, and the electrical components and connectors mounted on the edge of the mother board are usually arranged side by side and the interval therebetween is very small. If the transverse size of the cable end connector of the assembly is relatively large, the cable end connector interferes with other adjacent cable connector assemblies. The cable end connector assembly cannot mate with the complementary electrical connector reliably, thus, the signal transmission is influenced.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,402,552 (the Pat. '552) discloses such a Serial ATA cable end connector assembly comprising an electrical connector consisting of a dielectric housing and a contact module, a cable, and a cover over-molded with a front end of the cable. The contact module comprises a first housing piece received in a contact module receiving area and a plurality of contacts insert molded with the first housing piece. Tail portions of the contacts are exposed in an open communicating with the contact module receiving area. The tail portions are soldered with conductive cores of the cable respectively. The cover is over-molded with the tail portions of the contacts and the front ends of the conductive cores, and extends into the open. An outer surface of the cover and an outer surface of the housing are substantially on the same plane, so are the opposite outer surfaces. Thus, a transverse size of the electrical connector is decreased furthest and the connector will not interfere with other cable end connector assembly. However, the cover engages with the tail portions of the contacts, the front end of the cable and inner surfaces of the open only by friction. A user often grasps the cover to pull/insert the cable end connector assembly; thus, the cover is easy to break off. There exits in the art a solution of over-molding the cover over a rear end of the housing for attaining the cover to the housing more reliably. However, this increases the transverse size of the electrical connector and the connector interferes with other cable end connector assembly again.
Hence, a cable end connector assembly with a relatively small transverse size and a reliably attained cover is required to overcome the disadvantages of the related art.